Royalty and Ruin

Young Josiah Does All He Can Do

As King Josiah read the prophecies of swift judgment, he trembled for the future. The sins of Judah had been great. What would be the result of their continued apostasy? RR 142.1

“In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young,” he had consecrated himself fully to the service of God. At the age of twenty he had removed “the high places, the wooden images, the carved images, and the molded images.” “They broke down the altars of the Baals in his presence, and the incense altars ... and the wooden images ... he broke in pieces, and made dust of them and scattered it on the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. He also burned the bones of the priests on their altars, and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem.” 2 Chronicles 34:3-5. RR 142.2

The youthful ruler extended his efforts to the portions of Palestine formerly occupied by the ten tribes of Israel, only a feeble remnant of which now remained. “So he did,” the record reads, “in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, as far as Naphtali.” Verse 6. Not until he had crossed the length and breadth of this region of ruined homes, and “had broken down the altars and the wooden images, had beaten the graven images into powder, and cut down all the incense altars throughout all the land of Israel,” did he return to Jerusalem. Verse 7. RR 142.3

Thus Josiah had tried as king to exalt God’s holy law. And now, while Shaphan the scribe was reading to him out of the book of the law, the king recognized that this volume was a powerful ally in the work of reform he so much desired to see. He resolved to do all in his power to acquaint his people with its teachings and to lead them, if possible, to reverence and love the law of heaven. RR 142.4